Whence on each hand the gushing waters play,
And down the rough cafcade white-dashing fall,
Or gleam in lengthen'd vista through the trees,
You filent fteal; or fit beneath the fhade.
Of folemn oaks, that tuft the fwelling mounts
Thrown graceful round by Nature's careless hand,
And penfive liften to the various voice
Of rural peace: the herds, the flocks, the birds, 915
The hollow-whispering breeze, the plaint of rills,
That, purling down amid the twisted roots
Which creep around, their dewy murmurs shake
On the footh'd ear. From these abftracted oft,
You wander through the philosophic world;
Where in bright train continual wonders rife,
Or to the curious or the pious eye.
And oft, conducted by hiftoric truth,
You tread the long extent of backward time:
Planning, with warm benevolence of mind,
And honeft zeal unwarp'd by party-rage,
Britannia's weal; how from the venal gulph
To raise her virtue, and her arts revive.
Or, turning thence thy view, these graver thoughts
The Mufes charm: while, with fure tafte refin'd, 930
You draw th' infpiring breath of ancient fong;
Till nobly rifes, emulous, thy own.
Perhaps thy lov'd Lucinda fhares thy walk,
With foul to thine attun'd. Then Nature all
Wears to the lover's eye a look of love;
And all the tumult of a guilty world,
Toft by ungenerous paffions, finks away.
The tender heart is animated peace ;
And as it pours its copious treasures forth,
In varied converfe, foftening every theme,
You, frequent pausing, turn, and from her eyes,
Where meeken'd fenfe, and amiable grace,
And lively sweetnefs dwell, enraptur'd, drink
That nameless spirit of ethereal joy,
Unutterable happiness! which love,
Alone, beftows, and on a favour'd few.
Meantime you gain the height, from whofe fair brow
The bursting profpect fpreads immenfe around:
And fnatch'd o'er hill and dale, and wood and lawn,
And verdant field, and darkening heath between, 950
And villages embofom'd foft in trees,
And fpiry towns by furging columns mark'd
Of houfhold finoke, your eye excurfive roams :
Wide-stretching from the Hall, in whose kind haunt
The Hofpitable Genius lingers still,
To where the broken landskip, by degrees,
Afcending, roughens into rigid hills;
O'er which the Cambrian mountains, like far clouds
That skirt the blue horizon, dusky rise.
Flufh'd by the fpirit of the genial year,
Now from the virgin's cheek a fresher bloom
Shoots, lefs and lefs, the live carnation round;
Her lips blush deeper fweets; the breathes of youth;
The fhining moisture fwells into her eyes,
In brighter flow; her wishing bofom heaves,
With palpitations wild; kind tumults feize
Her veins, and all her yielding foul is love.
D 2
From the keen gaze her lover turns away,
Full of the dear extatic power, and fick
With fighing languishment. Ah then, ye fair!
Be greatly cautious of your fliding hearts:
Dare not th' infectious figh; the pleading look,
Downcast, and low, in meek submission drest,
But full of guile. Let not the fervent tongue,
Prompt to deceive, with adulation smooth,
Gain on your purpos'd will. Nor in the bower,
Where woodbines flaunt, and roses shed a couch,
While Evening draws her crimson curtains round,
Truft your foft minutes with betraying Man.
And let th' afpiring youth beware of love,
Of the smooth glance beware; for 'tis too late,
When on his heart the torrent-softness pours.
Then wisdom proftrate lies, and fading fame
Diffolves in air away; while the fond soul,
Wrapt in gay vifions of unreal blifs,
Still paints th' illufive form; the kindling grace;
Th' inticing smile; the modeft-feeming eye,
Beneath whose beauteous beams, belying heaven,
Lurk fearchlefs cunning, cruelty, and death:
And ftill falfe-warbling in his cheated ear,
Her fyren voice, enchanting, draws him on
To guileful fhores, and meads of fatal joy.
Ev'n prefent, in the very lap of love Inglorious laid; while mufic flows around, Perfumes, and oils, and wine, and wanton hours; 995 Amid the rofes fierce Repentance rears
Ter fnaky creft: a quick-returning pang
Shoots through the conscious heart; where honour still,
And great defign, against the oppreffive load
Of luxury, by fits, impatient heave.
But abfent, what fantastic woes arous'd,
Rage in each thought, by restless musing fed,
Chill the warm cheek, and blaft the bloom of life?
Neglected fortune flies; and fliding fwift,
Prone into ruin, fall his fcorn'd affairs.
'Tis nought but gloom around: the darken'd fun
Lofes his light. The rofy-bofom'd Spring
To weeping Fancy pines; and yon bright arch,
Contracted, bends into a dusky vault.
All Nature fades extinct; and fhe alone
Heard, felt, and feen, poffeffes every thought,
Fills every fenfe, and pants in every vein.
Books are but formal dulnefs, tedious friends;
And fad amid the focial band he fits,
Lonely, and unattentive. From his tongue
Th' unfinish'd period falls: while, borne away
On fwelling thought, his wafted fpirit flies
To the vain bofom of his diftant fair;
And leaves the femblance of a lover, fix'd
In melancholy fite, with head declin'd,
And love-dejected eyes. Sudden he starts,
Shook from his tender trance, and reftlefs runs
To glimmering fhades, and fympathetic glooms;
Where the dun umbrage o'er the falling ftream,
Romantic, hangs; there through the penfive dufk
Strays, in heart-thrilling meditation loft,
Indulging all to love: or on the bank
Thrown, amid drooping lilies, fwells the breeze
With fighs unceasing, and the brook with tears.
Thus in foft anguish he consumes the day,
Nor quits his deep retirement, till the moon
Peeps through the chambers of the fleecy east,
Enlighten'd by degrees, and in her train
Leads on the gentle hours; then forth he walks,
Beneath the trembling languifh of her beam,
With foften'd foul, and wooes the bird of eve
To mingle woes with his or while the world
And all the fons of Care lie hufh'd in fleep,
Affociates with the midnight fhadows drear ;
And, fighing to the lonely taper, pours
His idly-tortur'd heart into the page;
Meant for the moving messenger of love;
Where rapture burns on rapture, every line
With rifing frenzy fir'd. But if on bed
Delirious flung, fleep from his pillow flies.
All night he toffes, nor the balmy power
In any posture finds; till the grey morn
Lifts her pale luftre on the paler wretch,
Exanimate by love: and then perhaps
Exhaufted Nature finks a while to reft,
Still interrupted by distracted dreams,
That o'er the fick imagination rife,
And in black colours paint the mimic fcene.
Oft with th' enchantress of his foul he talks;
Sometimes in crowds diftrefs'd; or if retir'd
To fecret winding flower-enwoven bowers,
Far from the dull impertinence of Man,
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